Beautiful
by Hermione-G-Weasley
Summary: Hermione wonders why Ron likes her. This is an outtake from Chapter 56 of "When Things Start to Change."


I originally posted this at the Yahoo! group for "When Things Start to Change," but some people have emailed me saying they've had trouble accessing it.  So, here it is!

This takes place during Chapter 56.

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He was such a jerk sometimes!

  
Hermione paced the small area around her bed and tried to force herself to just get over it.  So Ron Weasley was a prat; she'd known that for five years.  She really shouldn't have been surprised.  
  
The door to her dormitory creaked open, and she turned around, ready to answer Parvati and Lavender's inquiries about why she'd disappeared.  She was just going to claim that she needed to study; no one would question that, and she wasn't about to tell them the real reason she'd walked out of the Common Room in the middle of all the gossiping- that she'd been upset because Ron was completely ignoring her in lieu of someone older and prettier.  But to her surprise, there was no one in the room when she looked.  She brushed it off as the wind or maybe Crookshanks had snuck in and disappeared under one of the beds.  

Turning back around, she jumped in shock when a voice interrupted the silence surrounding her.

"Hermione?"  Ron's head appeared before the rest of his body as he peeled the Invisibility Cloak off.

Hermione was outraged.  "Get out!" she said immediately.  "You're not allowed in here!"

Ron spoke while he folded the Cloak up.  "No one saw me.  Everyone is still downstairs."

"We'll get in so much trouble!" she protested heatedly.  "And anyway, how dare you sneak in here!  I could have been naked!"  She blushed right away as Ron appeared to be considering the possibility.  He didn't look as if he'd be too sorry if that had turned out to be the case.  Desperate to change the subject, she once again scolded him.  "You're going to get me in trouble."

Ron sighed.  "Hermione..."  
  
"Get out now, or I'll go and tell Dean."  She knew as well as he did that the threat was stupid.

Ron actually laughed.  "Right.  You go do that, Hermione.  He'd probably give me points, not take them away.  In case you hadn't noticed, Dean's not exactly the perfect Prefect."

Hermione had noticed.  The only people she'd seen him take points from were a group of Slytherins who were talking bad about Muggle-borns; apparently, he had been offended, as he himself was a Muggle-born.  He'd managed to overlook every other broken rule he'd been faced with.    
  
Hermione huffed up slightly.  "Then I'll tell Deena or Alicia or... somebody."  This was one of those rare times when she was actually thankful that she wasn't a Prefect; she was pretty sure that Gryffindor would likely lose the House Cup over this one event.  She was angry enough that, had she had the power, Gryffindor would probably have no points left.

Of course, she was more angry over personal issues than the fact that a boy had snuck into the girls' dormitory.  

"So, now we're twelve again, huh?" he asked, almost sounding amused.  "You're just going to tattle on me, is that it?"

"Just get out!"  She was getting infuriated now.

"Don't you want to talk to me?"  He wasn't joking anymore; if anything, his voice sounded rather serious.

Hermione wanted to scream.  "If I had wanted to talk to you, don't you think I would have stayed and listened to the rest of your little façade down there?  Not that it would have mattered anyway," she added sarcastically, "Unless someone gave me a bottle of blonde hair dye, you wouldn't have even noticed I was there."

Ron looked away, and Hermione knew that she had put a halt to any and all defense that he might have had.  He couldn't very well deny it; she wasn't blind, and she definitely wasn't dumb.

"Just go away," she said again, surprised at her ability to make her voice so calm.  "I don't want to talk to you."

Ron was silent for just a moment until he finally screwed up his face and said, "You're being stupid!"

Hermione could barely believe he'd just said that.  She even had to ask for clarification.  "Did you just call me stupid?!"

She had never, in fifteen years of life, ever, ever heard the word stupid in relation to herself.  

Ron looked for a moment as if he was going to apologize and explain himself, but stubbornness reigned, as it most often did.  He glared at her in a way that sent her back to many past arguments that had left her in tears.  "You've been calling me stupid since the first bloody day that I met you!"

She sent him back an equally icy glare.  "Well, at least I had a reason!"

"Did it ever occur to you," he asked in a dangerously controlled voice, "that I might have a reason, too?"

She narrowed her eyes, disliking him more and more with every passing second.  "I.  Am.  Not.  Stupid."  Each word was bitten out with angered vengeance.  

"Must be a hell of an actress then."

Hermione's mouth literally dropped open at his reply.  She'd wanted to hit him plenty of times in the five years that they'd been friends, but she'd never actually done it.    
  
She had a feeling that all of that was going to change in a very short minute.

"Don't you dare even attempt to turn this around on me," she said with a very low voice.  "And don't you ever call me stupid again."  
  
Ron's blue eyes shrank just a bit.  "Then give me a chance to explain before you start jumping to conclusions.  You have a serious problem with assuming things."  
  
"What's to assume?!" she asked, suddenly heated again.  "You'd rather tell Jamelle Baudelaire a pack full of lies than talk to me.  I saw it, so I thought I was doing you a favor by leaving you alone!"

"Hermione, I didn't even notice what was happening!"

"Exactly!" she said instantly, completely ignoring the fact that he sounded totally genuine in his claim.  "You didn't notice anything because you were to busy... _flirting... _with another bloody French girl!"

"_Flirting?!"  _Ron didn't sound like he could quite believe what he was hearing.  "Hermione, I was not flirting with her!  And she's not even French!"

"Well, her damn name is!"  Hermione crossed her arms, feeling silly because she was picking away for the tiniest details that had absolutely nothing to do with her argument.  However, it was currently all she had to go on.  "Why doesn't she go to Beauxbatons with all the other little blonde bitches?"

Hermione felt her cheeks heat up, immediately embarrassed by the immature little spill she'd just given.  She had never considered herself a petty person, but there was only so much she could take.

Ron was staring at her in flat-out disbelief.  He'd obviously not expected her to take that turn.  In truth, she hadn't meant to take it at all, and the tears that were threatening to fall from her eyes only irritated her even more.  

They stood silently for a long moment until Ron finally sighed and sat on her bed, reaching to the other side and pulling her down beside him.  They sat wordlessly side by side for another significant period of time until Hermione finally gave up.    
  


"Do you really like me?"

She looked away immediately, not wanting to look him in the eye.  She had no idea why she couldn't face him, but she could feel him staring at her profile.  

"What kind of a question is that?" he finally asked, and Hermione noticed that his voice was no longer loud and accusing as it had been just moments before.

"One that I want the answer for," she said quietly, still not looking up.

There was a pause and then, "I don't even understand why you're asking that.  Hermione, you know-"

She cut him off.  "Every girl I have ever seen you show any interest in has been beautiful and blonde and bubbly."

Her heart dropped when he didn't contradict her.

With a low derisive and joyless laugh, she muttered, "Too bad Harry got to Gia first, huh?"

"Oh, come on," he said, no longer silent.  "That is crazy, and you know it."  
  
She did.  She was just looking for something to shove in his face.  With no other defense, she decided to change the subject slightly.

"Ron, I will never look like those girls."  She grimaced a bit.  "So, what is it?"

She felt suddenly shy and nervous; they'd been 'together' for over a month now, but they'd yet to really sit down and discuss their feelings for each other.  It was understood between the two of them that what they had was not just physical attraction as was common among people their age, but it had always just been too awkward to have the whole 'I like you for this and this and this reason' conversation.  It had felt too formal, not like something two people who had been best friends for five years needed to do.  

But Hermione decided that she did need it.

As much as she trusted Ron, she trusted him with her life- she had for years, she was still wary of just what he was actually feeling.  She wanted desperately to believe that he liked her just as much as she did him, but little displays like the one earlier in the Common Room left her mind open to crazy insecurities that she couldn't just get past.  

Finally, after what seemed like too long of a deliberation period, Ron very quietly admitted, "Yeah, those girls are pretty.  Who wouldn't think so?"

Hermione studied the floor very intently.

But then she felt Ron's lips pressed very gently to the corner of her mouth.  In a soft whisper, he found her ear and said, "But you're beautiful."

She wondered how he did it.  She really, really wondered how in the world he could go from being Ron Weasley, insensitive jerk, one minute to Ron Weasley, absolutely perfect, the next.  

His lips slipped slowly up to her temple where he placed another small kiss.  "And brilliant."

She turned her head slightly and gave him a wary look.  "I thought you said I was stupid."  
  


"I lied."  He kissed her lips in a slow yet completely chaste manner, and Hermione suddenly found it incredibly difficult to be mad at him.  Her eyes, which she hadn't even realized had closed, fluttered open seconds later when he pulled away, dropping his forehead to rest against hers.  "And I do like you, Hermione.  A lot."  His eyes glanced down to where he was carefully closing his hand over her own.  His next words were spoken quietly, and he didn't look back up to meet her eye.  He didn't need to, though; she believed him and trusted that he was telling the truth.  "Way more than I could even imagine liking anyone else."

Hermione lifted her head slightly and carefully raised his chin with her hand.  "Even if I don't have blonde hair?"  She was teasing now; all was forgiven, and they both knew it.

Ron stayed strangely serious, though.  He looked at her closely for a long moment before reaching a hand up to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear.  "Please don't change your hair again.  Ever."  He didn't remove his hand, rather let it tangle mindlessly in her currently messy curls.  

And for some reason, that was all it took.    
  
Hermione leaned in and kissed him rather hard on the lips, forgetting completely that she had ever been irritated at him at all.  All she cared about was the fact that he did like her.  He liked her for who she was, not for what she looked like.  She would probably never be tall, she would probably never have the curves that girls like Jamelle Baudelaire and Fleur Delacour had, she would definitely never have the golden hair and crystal blue eyes that they had.  But it didn't matter.  She had something that at least one boy liked.

  
And that was plenty.

She knew that she would never be considered a 'classic beauty.'  Sure, she had turned the heads of more boys this year than she ever had in the past; it had been a given when she actually started caring about and putting a little effort into her appearance, but the novelty of it had worn off rather quickly.  She was never going to be one of those fairy tale beauties that left men speechless when she walked into a room, but she was okay with that.

After all, one of the main reasons she liked Ron so much was the fact that he had never and probably would never stay wordless around her.

They enjoyed arguing with each other too much.  It was just a given.

"What if Sirius Black does get back into Hogwarts?  Do you think they'll close the school?"

Hermione and Ron pulled away from the kiss in an instant.  Parvati's voice was clear, and the sound of footsteps immediately informed them that she and Lavender were rapidly approaching the door to the dormitory.  Without thinking, Hermione lunged for the Invisibility Cloak and threw it over Ron.    
  
The door opened half a second later.

"Hermione!"  The brunette jumped at the sound of her name.  Both of her roommates were looking extremely excited energized, probably by the prospect of another adventure with a so-called crazed and dangerous murderer loose in the hallways.  "Why did you leave so early?"  Parvati flopped down onto the nearest bed.  "Everyone is going mad trying to figure out what's really happened."  
  
Hermione nodded, glancing from the corner of her eye to make sure that Ron wasn't visible.  "Yeah, I know," she said, only the slightest bit jittery.  "I needed to study."  
  


"Where are your books?"  Lavender glanced around curiously before turning her gaze back to her roommate.  She pulled her jumper over her head as she waited for an answer, thankfully revealing a tank top underneath.  Hermione felt the bed shift slightly beneath her as Ron obviously noticed that Lavender Brown was about to strip. 

Hermione jumped up without hesitating.  "Lavender!  Oh, my God!  Don't move!"

The blonde froze on instant, a look of confused terror covering her face immediately.  "What?!" she yelled, panic rising in her voice.

Hermione rushed toward the other girl and grabbed her by the shoulders.  She pretended to be examining her closely and even upped her performance by kicking at the blue sweater lying on the floor.

"What is it?!" Lavender demanded again, still not moving and possibly even more terrified.

"A huge spider!"  Hermione pretended to be just as nervous as she looked all around.  Parvati shrieked and instantly jumped to a standing position on the bed she was currently sitting on.  Lavender started to whimper.

"Get it off, get it off, get it off!"  

"I can't find it," Hermione said, secretly commending herself for the act.  "It must have run under one of the beds or something."  
  


"Ah!  Find it!"  Lavender looked incredibly close to tears, and Hermione actually felt a bit bad.  "Just find it and kill it!"

Taking a breath, Hermione nodded.  "I'll go down to the Common Room and see if there's some sort of repellent down there or something."

Lavender just nodded, still on the verge of crying.  She hurried across the room to the bed Parvati was standing on and jumped onto it.  "We'll just wait here."

"Okay."  Hermione walked to the door slowly and opened it, praying that Ron would figure out the easy escape and take it.  She heard his footsteps padding lightly across the floor and was a bit anxious that Parvati and Lavender might have heard them, too.  They were both far too pre-occupied with searching every inch around the bed for the alleged spider to notice anything, though, and a second later, Hermione was shutting the door behind herself and Ron.

"Was there really a spider?"  Ron pulled off the Cloak, and she realized that he was incredibly pale.

Not really meaning to, Hermione giggled, immediately raising a hand to stifle it.  "No," she said, struggling not to embarrass him.  "But Lavender was about to change clothes."  
  


"And?"    
  
Ron was looking at her so seriously and so expectantly that she almost started feeling insecure again.  He grinned a second later, though, and she smacked him across the arm.  "And you would have covered your eyes, of course," she said sarcastically.  
  


"Nah," Ron shook his head.  "But I would have an excuse, though- the blonde hair, you know."  
  
Hermione couldn't help it.  She laughed.  "Just shut up while you're ahead."

"Yes, Miss Granger," he said obediently, cracking a smile as he watched her.  

She smiled back.    
  
She was just happy; there were no other words for it.

Leaning onto tiptoe, she kissed him quickly.  "Goodnight."  
  
He leaned down and kissed her for a little longer.  "Night."  And then he twirled a single curl of hers through his fingers, kissing her once more and adding a quiet, "Beautiful."

He disappeared under the Cloak, and Hermione heard him heading quickly toward the stairs.  She stood outside of her dormitory door for a very long moment, wondering idly if he knew how special he was, how special he had always been.

Because just as she would always be beautiful to him, he would always be amazing to her.  

Even without the exaggerated tales of heroism that always made him briefly popular with everyone else.  

He might not have had the scar or the fame, but Hermione had seen a hero in him the moment he'd saved her from a Mountain Troll with a simple 'Wingardium Leviosa.'  

And she prayed that he would always remember that.

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